Summer ’08: Where we went

The survey conducted by The Paw Print of the entire student body indicated the countries that the students traveled to and how many visited over the summer.

By MONICA BOUYEA and ALIXANDRA BINNEY
Story editors

“Poly kids are doers. We have active people, and in the summer, our kids are more active than ever,” boasts college counselor Alice Cotti.

This past summer, Poly students embarked on many adventures both close to home and across the globe rather than submitting themselves to the routine and seemingly pointless activities that occupy the time of many other young adults. Cotti highlights the importance of taking advantage of summer opportunities to a student’s development when she comments, “Every student must do what is best at that time for him or her, whether that be developing a talent, taking a summer course, or exploring part of the world and encountering different cultures.”

When surveyed, Poly students proved they could follow Cotti’s advice. The results showed that 204 individuals traveled during the summer to countries as diverse as Fiji, Sri Lanka and Peru.

Only 54 students admitted to having selected their summer pursuit with the intent of padding their résumés, while 209 decided what they would do simply for personal enjoyment. The survey illustrated a wide range of Poly activities over the summer vacation including internships, community service activities, study abroad programs and more. And reflecting the typical competitive, inquisitive and quirky Poly student, these activities varied from the conventional to the remarkable to the definitely unconventional.
Junior Caroline Nutt pursued volunteering in Costa Rica for a month through the World Horizons program. Her interest was sparked during her visit to an orphanage in Tijuana, Mexico through the Corazón de Vida Club. Although she knew her choice of activities would look good for college, more importantly, she says, “I loved the feeling of accomplishment I got afterwards.”
Other students use summer as an opportunity to become familiar with a university. Senior Monique Chan decided to spend her summer taking classes on urban culture and history in a program at Columbia University, a college she’s interested in attending. She chose Columbia University particularly “to get a good feel of the place – its neighborhood, setting, cafeteria…” She tried a program at the University of Southern California last year and decided to continue on that trend this summer.
Senior Adela Wu worked for one and a half months as a paid lab assistant at USC, which helped her pursue her interest in medicine. “The experience opened my eyes to what goes on from day to day in the life of a scientist; it is a lot of collecting data and being patient,” Wu notes. The knowledge – and $500 paycheck – she gained from this experience are invaluable, and it was an opportunity that she could only enjoy during summer break.
On the other hand, 143 students revealed that they studied during break, some for a new learning experience or personal enjoyment, but others, like junior Vanessa Brandon, had a more pragmatic reason in mind. Brandon enrolled in SAT classes for approximately 10 hours a week and AP Biology classes for 5 hours a week at the San Marino Academy. She states her reasons candidly. “I want to get into a good college, get my grades up, and get a head start to relieve stress during the year,” she says, attributing her highly studious summer to pressure from both her parents and herself.
Poly students’ summer undertakings reflect distinct interests and differing motivations. To Poly students, the summer is seen as a highway transporting them to opportunities they would not have the time or energy to benefit from during the school year. Essentially, summer is now a chance to discover a latent ability or passion outside of one’s comfort zone and students should not feel confined to limiting their activities based on “what colleges want to see.”
“Three months is a long time to just sit around,” eleventh grade Dean Doug Jolly admits. “Students come back with a good experience, or at the least, with a broadened view of the world,” he expresses. “They often have a new academic passion that they want to pursue or a new sense of responsibility that allows them to be wiser and more confident.”
So, despite not having the utopian lazy summer vacations we had planned, we embark on this school year ready to apply the lessons learned over the summer, and invigorated to learn from the experiences of fellow students.